Newly released bank data for Ulster County shows that the trend toward larger percentage gains in deposits for local and small regional banks than for the national banks is continuing.

Though the ribbon-cutting for the almost 19,500-square-foot Engineering Innovation Hub on the SUNY New Paltz campus September 17 had been widely anticipated, a press release announcing that Central Hudson, which had already granted the manufacturing center $250,000 over three years, was kicking in another $200,000 to the project (a $50,000 match has already been contributed by local companies) added further support for the event.

After more than 90 days in office, Ulster County executive Pat Ryan last week has finally laid some of his cards on the table in regard to economic development.

In 2011 New Paltz farmer Paul Alward, Bywater Bistro proprietor Sam Ullman and self-described “health nut” Joe Katona had teamed up with financier John Fitzgibbons to found Hudson Valley Harvest. They wanted the Hudson Valley to develop the kind of brand identity and degree of market organization in order to compete successfully with giant non-local producers and distributors. Hudson Valley Harvest has operated year-round since then from its leased headquarters in TechCity in the Town of Ulster.

This will probably be the second to last — at least for a while — of our occasional columns in this space about flight activities at Stewart Airport. The two years of Norwegian Air’s experiment with the Newburgh airport for low-cost international flights is coming to a close a week from this coming Sunday, on September 15. The most dramatic traffic boost in Stewart’s commercial history is about to come to an unwelcome end.

Change is in the air at SUNY New Paltz. It was evident last week as a diverse new class moved in and college president Donald Christian spoke on themes of diversity, inclusion and equity.

The regions of the New York City metro area are all parts of the immense agglomeration that constitutes the most influential of world cities, each with a distinctive character of its own. Each region has different contributions to make and different roles to play. Each faces its own strengths and weaknesses, has its own distinctive style, and searches for its own opportunities both as part of the larger metropolis and within its own boundaries.

As a world city, New York can’t afford to ignore the Big Five tech firms — Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Google and Facebook. With a combined market value of about $4.2 trillion, these five goliaths account for more than twelve percent of the dollars in the United States stock market. What they do and where they do it involves the whole society and is very important in the world economy.